Brunell Trade: WUSA vs. The World

Don't go.

Here's what WUSA says, which clearly isn't as strong as what they were saying, but is still pretty strong: "Shortly after the Redskins lost to the Jaguars, sources told 9SPORTS NOW that Quarterback Mark Brunell is expected to be traded to the Seattle Seahawks. The sources, who are close to Brunell, said a trade to the Seahawks is in the works and could be completed in the next few days."

Pretty confident, no? Meanwhile, here's what The Post is saying: "Sources close to Brunell said the veteran had been told nothing about a trade being completed, or even close, after the game."

Apparently there are dueling camps of sources close to Brunell. A lot of times, "sources close to the athlete" seems to be shorthand for "the athlete." As for Brunell himself was discussing the rumors as early as 5:40 yesterday with the senior editor of Jaguars.com, who wrote this: "Jeff Lageman and I were having a little pregame conversation in my office, which is directly across from the visitors' locker room, when there was a knock at the door. You guessed it; Mark Brunell. He knew where to go for some hot rumors and a trip down memory lane. Speaking of hot rumors, how about this one: Brunell to Seattle? It didn't seem to upset him."

In the meantime, it will be pile-on-WUSA time, as evidenced by this report in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer: "Adding intrigue to injury in the first half was an erroneous report by a Washington, D.C., TV station that said the Seahawks had completed a trade for veteran quarterback Mark Brunell, the former Washington Husky. A Seahawks spokesman denied that a deal had been made and the TV station later retracted its own report."

Bram Weinstein in Covering the Redskins refused even to name WUSA and enthusiastically spread ashes over their report, like so: ""Joe Gibbs flatly denied a televised report that Mark Brunell had been traded to Seattle for a late round draft pick.. One highly placed source told me after the game the team currently has no interest in trading Brunell."

So we have contradictory sources close to Brunell, who is openly discussing the rumors as an out-of-area newspaper makes fun of WUSA, which stands by much of its report, while a highly placed football source says the team has no interest. Someone is going to be unhappy after all of this. Meanwhile....Jordan Palmer? Yeah, well. Great mustache, anyhow.